Remember a time on Gotham when Poison Ivy was a kid, just like Bruce Wayne? And then she fell into a drain and emerged a woman ... with a child's mind? As if that wasn't weird or controversial enough, Ivy Pepper is getting yet another new form: Peyton List. Fox announced today that List (who has had recurring roles on The Flash, Mad Men, and starred in her own CW show Frequency) will be joining Gotham's cast as the latest iteration of Poison Ivy, who is set to debut with the cast in early 2018.

The Gotham producers try to explain themselves in the press release, saying:

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Image via The CW

“In the continuing evolution of Poison Ivy's origin story, Ivy Pepper has been transformed once again taking another step toward becoming the Ivy we know from the comics. Dangerous. A live wire of crazy energy. She'll set her sights on Gotham, intent on making the city her own green paradise.”

So ... ok. What it sounds like is "Poison Ivy still isn't wile and sexy enough, so we recast her again." The other issue though, of course, is does she still have the mind of a child? That has not yet been answered ... Let's hope whatever causes this "evolution" on the show also somehow explains that she spent time in an alternative dimension and grew up in mind as well as body, because y'all ...

Peyton List is great, and will surely be a good addition to the show, but the recasting of this particular character again is such a strange thing. You had to know something was up though when Ivy just disappeared from the story this season and nobody seemed to care where she was. Not sure why Maggie Geha has been replaced (she herself replaced Clare Foley), but apparently this is what Gotham does now.

Be sure to check back on Collider Thursday nights for Vinnie Mancuso's Gotham recaps, which are pure gold.

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Image via Fox
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Image vix Fox
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Image via The CW